I was already nodding my head. “I did. You can add one of those to the order as well.”
“The little girl said that the buttercream one is her favorite,” she sighed wistfully. “They’re all my favorites, but this one is definitely one of my mom’s best.”
“Your mom owns this place?” I asked as I pulled out money to pay.
“Yes,” she said. “We moved in here about a month ago. It’s great. Much better than our last location out of our house.”
Her teasing tone had me grinning.
“I’m sure,” I said as I spied a snickerdoodle cookie that had my name on it. “Can I have a dozen of those, too?”
She looked at the cookies and then nodded. “Sure thing.”
“Y’all see that little girl a lot?” I questioned. “I had the impression that she was here quite a bit.”
“Every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.” She smiled. “One o’clock, on the dot. They’re here to visit her mom who’s over at the mental health facility next door.”
“Does she work there?” I questioned, trying to sound nonchalant.
“I don’t honestly know,” she admitted. “I haven’t been able to get that information out of her. The moment she starts getting talkative, her uncle shuts her up with a stern look.”
Uncle.
Oh, holy shit.
What the hell was going on here?
“Well, I appreciate you helping me,” I said as I held out the crisp one-hundred-dollar bill to her. “I want to make sure I get the girl this cookie and cupcake before visiting hours are over next door. I hope you have a good one.”
The teen smiled as she counted out change. “You, too.”
Instead of parking it on the bench right outside the door, I walked around to the side of the bakery and took a seat in the seating area and waited.
It took them another twenty-six minutes to get there but get there they did.
At first, Tyson didn’t see me.
His face was clouded with something I couldn’t decipher, and he looked upset.
The kid did, too.
She was about five to six years old, and a little bit of a thing.
Hell, I would’ve guessed she was younger if it wasn’t for the chattering she was doing, as well as the non-baby look to her. Her face was skinny, and her limbs were delicate and fine. There was no baby fat on her at all like there would’ve been if she were younger.
“I want to stay longer next time,” the girl pouted.
“I’m sorry, Linnie,” Tyson said. “But you know that we can’t. Rules are rules.”
Linnie grumbled something under her breath and then stopped to pick up a rock that was on the ground next to the fence. “I like this one, I’ll save it for Theo.”
Tyson came to a sudden halt the moment he looked up and spotted me sitting there, staring directly at him.
His throat bobbed as he swallowed hard, and he looked like he’d just tasted something foul.
And was that fear that I could see on his face?
He looked down at the little girl beside him and went ashen.
“Linnie, darlin’,” Tyson said. “Why don’t you run into the bakery and use the potty. We’re going to stop at the grocery store on the way home and they don’t have a bathroom.”
The little girl did as he said without protest, and then we were left alone. Which was weird. There was zero hesitation. No backtalk. No ‘can I have another cookie while I’m in there.’ No nothing.
That wasn’t normal for a child.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
Tyson knew exactly who I was.
He knew because he’d seen me around town. Had met me when all the shit had gone down between his brother and a friend and fellow club member, Linc James.
Yes, that Linc James.
The professional football player who was so pretty it hurt.
At least, that was what I’d heard, anyway.
“I’m curious,” I admitted. “That, and we’re working right over there.”
He looked over his shoulder at the trucks that had the line almost replaced, then back at me.
He didn’t buy that I was there and so conveniently placed.
Whatever.
I wasn’t.
When he still didn’t speak, I leaned forward.
“Tell me what’s going on,” I ordered.
Tyson looked away, his face going to the door of the asylum he’d just come out of.
The little girl came back just as quickly as she’d left, and Tyson sighed. Bleeping the locks on his Mercedes, he gestured for the little girl to go to it.
“Get in and buckle your seat belt before you start watching the television,” he instructed the little girl.
There was no argument from Linnie. No nothing.
Again, not normal. Not normal at all.
The little girl was in the back seat, sitting timidly in the car seat, watching a movie that was on the flip down entertainment system in Tyson’s Mercedes.
“You can’t handle the truth,” he admitted. “And, honestly, there’s nothing in the world you could give me that would make me tell you. I’m keeping two people safe here.”
I narrowed my eyes.
“Two? And safe from who?” I asked.
Tyson’s chin went up as he refused to answer.
“Tara?” I asked.
He didn’t twitch.
“Andy?” I pushed.
He stiffened slightly.
“Daddy?” I barked.
He began walking in the direction of his car door.
“I’m never going to confirm or deny it,” he said softly. “You may be curious.” He opened the door. “But your curiosity isn’t worth their lives.”
With that, he got in and didn’t look back.
Which only made me more curious.
My eyes went to the mental facility where someone—someone very important to Tyson—sat inside.
And I had a feeling I knew who it was.
Now, I only had to figure out how to get in there to confirm my suspicions.
Chapter 3
Monday must be a man. It comes too quickly.
-Coffee Cup
Liner
My big break came in the form of the PI.
He sent me a message telling me that visiting hours for the facility were Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays for thirty minutes at a time.
However, if I didn’t want to do it at normal times, I could volunteer.
Since he was still looking into who it was exactly that Tyson was visiting, I could either wait or go in there blind.
I was going in there blind.
I was also going in there when I had zero time to spare.
The line of storms was barreling down on us and would be here in less than four days. That meant I had three days or so to find out what I wanted to find out or I’d likely be busy for at least the next week.
And knowing that, it would kill me knowing that I didn’t have answers—I was an answer person. I had to have them and understand a problem, or it would literally drive me insane.
That was the problem with having an enormously high, immeasurable IQ. My brain literally never stopped working. I had to challenge it, or things would go bad—meaning I would get myself into trouble.
I looked over at my dog, who I’d taught to do everything from bark on command, to play dead or get me a beer.
“You ready to go, Monster?” I asked my Standard Poodle mix who was actually named Monster.
He was a freakishly large dog for his particular combination of breeds and weighed in at a hundred and twenty pounds. He resembled more of a Great Dane’s build, and likely had some of the larger breeds in his lineage. But, since he was a rescue, I didn’t really know what all was in him except for the Poodle part thanks to the curly hair that I had to get trimmed once a month or it’d be fuckin’ awful.
Monster, who was
intelligent like me, got up and started for the door, making sure to pick his leash up on the way.
He looked at me over his shoulder and I caught the leash and clipped it on him before I opened the door to the house.
I grinned as I remembered telling him to go shit on Tara’s lawn and him actually doing it. The resulting chaos that had ensued from that one command had been enough to cause me to grin about it even a year and a half later.
My phone beeped, and my grin widened slightly at seeing my new ID.
“Look at that, Monster,” I said to my dog. “You’re a certified rehab K-9.”
The badge that the PI had taken a picture of made us both look all official and shit.
I pressed my hand to the leather vest that I was wearing and wondered if I should just leave it here, but then decided that I’d just stow it in my saddlebags for the couple of hours that I’d be there.
Heart pounding and excitement thrumming through my veins, I tucked Monster’s leash into his collar and told him to get seated.
“Load up,” I ordered.
He did, heading for the trailer that I pulled with my bike when he was making the rounds with me.
I didn’t own a truck.
I didn’t need one.
If I did need one, I just borrowed a company one and went on about my business.
Meaning that when I wanted to go anywhere and Monster needed to go, too, he sat in the specially designed trailer that was made just for him.
It had a seat and everything.
He even had dog glasses to protect his eyes.
Heading for my bike, I backed it up to the trailer and hooked everything up. Once I slipped Monster’s eye protection on, we motored out and headed for the drop off location to pick up Monster’s therapy dog vest, and my new badge.
After thanking the assistant who worked for our PI for meeting us, I was headed to The Bridge and thinking about a plan. A plan that centered around finding who I thought to be in there, but may not actually be in there.
But I chose to hedge my bets and hoped that I’d find something more on what was going on, and also hoped that the chatty office lady was still there today so I could ask her questions.
It turned out that I was in luck because the same woman was there as was last time.
But before I’d even gone in, I made sure to stop by the bakery and get the cupcake that was said to be Linnie’s ‘mother’s’ favorite.
After stowing it in the murse—man purse—that I thought might be helpful to have with me in case of emergency, I made my way in and smiled my brightest smile at the woman behind the desk.
“Hello,” I called out the moment I was close enough to be heard. “How are you doing today?”
She couldn’t remember where she knew me from, and I saw the moment she decided that the reason she knew me was because I’d been there before with the therapy dogs.
“Hello,” she smiled brightly. “How are you two doing today?” Her eyes went to the poodle and she frowned. “My, that’s a big dog.”
I agreed with a nod of my head.
“I’m here to start my rounds,” I showed her my badge. “Where would y’all like me today?”
Her brows furrowed, and then she shook her head and said, “I don’t remember y’all being on the schedule for today, but that doesn’t mean much. I’m only told limited information. If you want to head on back.” She pressed a button beside her desk. “I’ll buzz you back.”
I winked at her and started inside, my eyes taking everything in as I moved.
Oh, this was going to be fun.
***
An hour and a half later, I was fairly sure that everyone in the particular mental health facility I was in wasn’t actually mentally ill.
Every single one that I’d spoken with over the last hour seemed to be a functional adult, and I hadn’t met one yet that seemed to be missing a few of their Cocoa Puffs like I’d expected.
The only one that really gave me pause was a man named Albert, and that was only because he wasn’t wearing any pants. But, even then, he’d been about to go into the sauna—yes, you read that right, a fuckin’ sauna in a mental health facility.
Now, I was left wondering if I’d met every patient that The Bridge had to offer.
There were four rooms that I hadn’t managed to get into yet.
One was a staff break room. The second was a patient’s room that was said to be outside near the pond that I hadn’t found. The third was the boiler room. And the fourth was a conference room where I was told families and their patients met to discuss their progress.
I was considering what I would do now when I heard a throat clear.
“Excuse me, that’s my room you’re standing in front of and I can’t get by.”
Monster chose that moment to sit on my feet, meaning I could only turn my head to see the woman.
Only, she was very short, and I had to nearly press my chin to my chest to be able to look her in the eyes.
And what I saw made my heart pound.
It was not-Tara.
In a wheelchair.
Was it politically correct to call someone short that happened to be in a wheelchair?
I didn’t really know.
“Oh, sorry,” I fake apologized. I’d been hoping that she would come to her room eventually instead of making me chase her around the grounds. I had a feeling the elusive patient of The Bridge was her. At least, I was hoping it was her. “Monster, move.”
Monster moved, but only so that he could walk up to the woman and place his head in her lap.
The goofy dog.
He knew exactly what to do to play it off.
Not-Tara looked down at the dog and…cried.
Her hands went to the dog’s head, and she dropped her head to her chest, shielding her eyes. And at first, I didn’t realize she was crying. It was only after a tear hit the top of Monster’s nose and he licked it off that I understood.
Sitting down in the chair beside the room, I waited while she and Monster had their moment.
My eyes caught on the tattoo that was dead on match with Tara’s, and I felt my stomach somersault.
And I counted the differences between these two ladies.
Other than the obvious wheelchair and the ghostly blue eyes, I could tell much more of a difference now.
Her body was skinny. Too skinny.
So skinny that I realized she was on the verge of something scary, skinny. Like death.
I could see all the bones in her arms and legs. I could see ribs underneath the regulation white t-shirt that the entire crew of patients here wore. Her eyes, before she’d looked away, had deep, dark bags underneath them.
Compared to Tara’s shining, bleached platinum-blonde hair, not-Tara’s had a soft golden brown to it. At least at the top. About halfway to the top, I could tell that her hair had once been bleached and dyed—as if appearing to look more like a certain platinum blonde at one point in time. But she’d either let it grow out on purpose, or she hadn’t been able to make it to the hairdresser in a while.
The latter was likely the reason. I had a feeling that the girl sitting in front of me liked her control…yet never got to get it.
And the goddamn tears. The ones that had happened last time with her sitting on the bed years ago? That was how I knew this was the same woman as then.
This woman and that woman were one and the same.
What I was confused on, however, was if this woman that was sitting in front of me and that woman were completely separate from Tara—different people entirely—or if they were the same. Only, Tara had multiple personalities.
But then I thought about the kid that came with Tyson—Tyson who had been adamant about disliking Tara—and Matias being near the same age. They had to be. That girl was about five years old, and with Matias being four when he died a year ago, that meant that the little girl and Matias would’ve been very close in age.
But my gut was leaning toward not-Tara and Tara being two different people.
A feeling that stuck with me as I watched the woman hold her hand out and stroke the dog’s fur.
When the tears finally stopped, I couldn’t stop myself from saying, “What’s your name, darlin’?”
Her eyes found mine, and I sucked in a breath for a different reason this time.
God, those eyes. So fuckin’ beautiful.
“Theo,” she answered hesitantly. “My name is Theo. Theodora, really.”
What I did not see there was any type of understanding. Of dots that were connecting.
She had no clue who I was.
No clue that I knew the other her. The other her that was an awful person and was fucked in her head.
No, this really couldn’t be the same woman.
I’d see something, right? I’d be able to tell that she knew me. I spent years living beside that nasty woman. There was no way on God’s green Earth that this woman and that woman were the same. Even if it would make sense.
I offered the woman my hand and said, “My name is Josiah, but my friends call me Liner.”
She took it hesitantly for all of two seconds, then dropped it like I’d had something slimy on my hand.
I looked down at my hand and only saw the calluses from work and lifting weights there.
Deciding to change the subject before she got uncomfortable again, I blurted out the first thought that came to my mind.
“Monster’s really good about laying there and getting pets,” I said, leaning back in my seat and stretching my long legs out in front of me. “Did you have a pet growing up?”
She looked like she’d love to tell me something but thought differently of it.
“No,” she said softly. “I had a baby squirrel once, but my sister found it and threw it into the garbage.”
Her hand covered her mouth as if she hadn’t meant to say so much.
Ignoring the way I wanted to pull her into my arms, I changed the subject. “What’s your favorite kind of music to listen to?”
Her face shuttered. “I don’t get to listen to much music in here.”
Snitches Get Stitches Page 3